This'll be a short one.
I keep hearing about this sort of situation: You start up a forum, RPG or not, it doesn't matter. You work hard on it. When it's all ready to start, you tell your friends and anyone else you think might be interested, about it.
They ooh and ahh over the graphics, the concept, the layout, the setup. "I love your forum! Wow, great work!" Etc. You have people crowing over your board, which is great news, right? You're going to have an easy time starting this one!
Then, none of them or almost none of them actually sign up. A few might, but even they tend to drop off quickly. What happened to the love? The grand plans to join and become great members?
The truth hurts, but it's simple: They're just not that into your board.
These people are your friends. They'll compliment you just to make you feel good about something that they know you worked hard on. Even if they are initially wowed by it and genuinely might want to join, the actual level of interest just doesn't carry in this case.
But what about the strangers you asked on Helpmewithmynewforum.com? They were all diggin' it too! Well, probably not as much as they or you thought.
The big mistake most people make at this point is waiting for them to show up and follow through. They won't. Cut your losses {if any} and move on. Make sure also that you aren't fishing for compliments when you ask for opinions on your board. Ask for genuine feedback, and prepare yourself to hear things you might not want to hear. What seems perfect and intuitive to you might not be the same at all to prospective members. You need their perspective, not yours. Frankly, your own point of view on your own forum is about as far as you can get from a helpful one.
Your best feedback comes from those people who, in the end, didn't join your board.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Thursday, July 14, 2011
"I just can't please them! What am I doing wrong?"
That member who has joined your game, and has managed to point out just how horrid and flawed it is. What you wouldn't give to fix your game and make them happy!
Perhaps they started out nice enough. They joined, said a big "Hi!" to everyone, and then their complaints reared their ugly head in the application phase, or maybe they did okay there and got as far as the roleplay itself before finding a hundred reasons why your website sucks. Something's wrong with your rules, your staff, your plots, your members...you! And like an attentive, caring admin you look into these issues and want to fix them ASAP!
Well of course you do. You're a good administrator and what good administrator wants to run a bad forum? So you change a few rules or whatever on their recommendation. You figure, what the hell, right? If it winds up making them happy, you can all go back to having fun and you won't have lost a member in the process.
Only...it doesn't make them happy. They find more and more to hate about your board. Everything that happens, they find at fault. The littlest things seem like a big deal to them. And there you are, scrambling around trying to find a fix for your forum.
What would you say if I told you the fix is easy and right in front of you?
I only wish I hadn't had to learn all of this the hard way--several times, because I don't always seem to get it on the first go-around. :P:
Changing or bending your game hoping to "make the person happy" never works. Never. If they come in unhappy or grow quickly unhappy with the game as it is {and I mean within the first couple weeks/months--many people have a "new person" phase when they are on their best behaviour but it soon wears off and they appear to change for the worse without cause--this is not them changing, this is how they really are} that is not your game's fault. A naturally happy and easygoing person will adapt to your game when they are new and familiarising themselves with it, or if it doesn't suit them, they will casually leave--because it isn't in the nature of happy, carefree people to stay in a situation that makes them unhappy when they could easily leave it.
Unhappy, complaining people will be that, wherever they go, and whatever game they join. Whatever you do to try and make them happy on your game. Yet they will often not leave of their own accord. Misery loves company, after all.
And unhappiness is as contagious as happiness. Surround yourself with the happy folks on your game. I mean those who are glad to be a part of it the way it is, even if it isn't perfect, because nothing is perfect. Let the rest go on and find somewhere else to commiserate. They will not be happy until they figure out how to do that for themselves.
So! About that fix?
By now they may have gotten totally out of control, so the first thing you want to do is shoot them a polite but firm private message, and halt any chaos they are currently causing, chances are they are causing some, somewhere on your forum. Make it clear to them they have stepped way over the line and face suspension if they don't respect your authority. If that doesn't work, have the ban hammer at the ready.
Again, misery loves company. They won't be alone out there.
Perhaps they started out nice enough. They joined, said a big "Hi!" to everyone, and then their complaints reared their ugly head in the application phase, or maybe they did okay there and got as far as the roleplay itself before finding a hundred reasons why your website sucks. Something's wrong with your rules, your staff, your plots, your members...you! And like an attentive, caring admin you look into these issues and want to fix them ASAP!
Well of course you do. You're a good administrator and what good administrator wants to run a bad forum? So you change a few rules or whatever on their recommendation. You figure, what the hell, right? If it winds up making them happy, you can all go back to having fun and you won't have lost a member in the process.
Only...it doesn't make them happy. They find more and more to hate about your board. Everything that happens, they find at fault. The littlest things seem like a big deal to them. And there you are, scrambling around trying to find a fix for your forum.
What would you say if I told you the fix is easy and right in front of you?
I only wish I hadn't had to learn all of this the hard way--several times, because I don't always seem to get it on the first go-around. :P:
Changing or bending your game hoping to "make the person happy" never works. Never. If they come in unhappy or grow quickly unhappy with the game as it is {and I mean within the first couple weeks/months--many people have a "new person" phase when they are on their best behaviour but it soon wears off and they appear to change for the worse without cause--this is not them changing, this is how they really are} that is not your game's fault. A naturally happy and easygoing person will adapt to your game when they are new and familiarising themselves with it, or if it doesn't suit them, they will casually leave--because it isn't in the nature of happy, carefree people to stay in a situation that makes them unhappy when they could easily leave it.
Unhappy, complaining people will be that, wherever they go, and whatever game they join. Whatever you do to try and make them happy on your game. Yet they will often not leave of their own accord. Misery loves company, after all.
And unhappiness is as contagious as happiness. Surround yourself with the happy folks on your game. I mean those who are glad to be a part of it the way it is, even if it isn't perfect, because nothing is perfect. Let the rest go on and find somewhere else to commiserate. They will not be happy until they figure out how to do that for themselves.
So! About that fix?
By now they may have gotten totally out of control, so the first thing you want to do is shoot them a polite but firm private message, and halt any chaos they are currently causing, chances are they are causing some, somewhere on your forum. Make it clear to them they have stepped way over the line and face suspension if they don't respect your authority. If that doesn't work, have the ban hammer at the ready.
Again, misery loves company. They won't be alone out there.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Why is my RPG dying?
I've covered topics close to this one, but I think that, or at least hope that, this is a first for covering everything that I am trying to cover in this entry.
Currently it is about 90 degrees in this room, I am monitoring my own roleplaying site while browsing around and trying to keep cool. I visited one of my old haunts while clearing out my bookmarks and come to find that despite supposedly having once made millions of posts, it too is now dying, like so many other long term RPG forums.
What makes a roleplaying forum die? Most of the same things that cause any forum to die--mainly stasis. But to just say "stasis killed my board" isn't very helpful so I'll try to get to the meat of it.
The focus of this post is roleplaying forums so I will be specific to those, though a lot of it applies to any forum. You start your forum with a small group of friends, either those you had already or those you get right after you set it up, or a mix. Many times a forum dies after this core of original members moves on, because your forum failed to adapt to a changing member base. Maybe it became too closed to new players--a very common problem often exacerbated by the senior, original group of members who will often exclude them.
But a great many forums don't act exclusive at all. They are open to newbies, welcoming and kind, yet those newbies somehow stop coming after a while. You still have been advertising, still affiliating...doing everything right. So why after 5 years {or thereabouts} is your forum going belly up?
Many RPG owners are happy to let their community shrink down to a few folks and roll to a satisfying stop, before closing the game and happily moving on with fond memories. But there you are, a struggling administrator who certainly isn't ready for retirement. You're trying new plots, encouraging members to recruit others, and still your game continues to go.
One big sign that there's serious trouble is a lot of long term, active members leaving in groups, with few to no newbies coming in. This is perhaps THE alarm signal that your game is drowning. When this happens the end is already near and unless you do something drastic, you're looking at closure of the game usually within a few more months, though it can limp along for years if at least a few people stick around and you're willing to keep plugging at it.
Stop the struggle; it may actually be simpler than you think to turn things around.
To understand why it's dying, it may help to understand how it has lived. A roleplaying forum goes through life stages like a person does! Starting out in an energetic infancy, with an open mind, if little experience, growing into powerful prime of life with well established staff and members, and eventually succumbing to old age, when it tends to become set in its ways and not as open to different ways or change anymore.
But unlike a person, we can give our aging RPGs a drink from the fountain of youth!
--Your game likely began things a lot more open and rules-light than it wound up. How many rules have you added over the months or years? All games need rules, but if you're down to your last handful of members anyway, how many of them do you actually need? Turn back the clock and strip away those rules you thought you needed but that are probably the #1 factor killing your game. Ideally, you could just go back to the rule set, and minimum writing standards {do you REALLY need 500 words per post?} that you had when you started it. It was good enough then, and at this point, what do you have to lose? This is a rebirth of your site, so give it a second life! But brace yourself--people hate rule removals a lot more than adding new rules. Be sure to make it clear to them that it's a trial period and done as a last resort--and it was what got everyone started anyway. You can make a couple compromises if you need to, but the aim here is opening your game to as many new folks as you can.
--If you think tightening up on activity rules and activity checks is a smart move right now, think again. Your members' interest is flagging as it is--the last thing they want to hear is more pressure to log on X number of days a week. It just might be the breaking point for them. Remove them altogether--they don't work anyway.
--Don't do major changes to the plots that are mandatory in any way. By all means introduce new elements--you should be doing that on a regular basis anyhow--but don't require people to up and change their roleplaying just because "this is how we're going to do it now." Give them an alternative to continue playing out their original roleplays while you bring in the new elements as optional.
--Promotional efforts also need to be kept up to date. Chances are that the methods you used 5 years ago are probably not as effective now.
Here's hoping these tips help you rejuvenate your game! It's never too late.
Currently it is about 90 degrees in this room, I am monitoring my own roleplaying site while browsing around and trying to keep cool. I visited one of my old haunts while clearing out my bookmarks and come to find that despite supposedly having once made millions of posts, it too is now dying, like so many other long term RPG forums.
What makes a roleplaying forum die? Most of the same things that cause any forum to die--mainly stasis. But to just say "stasis killed my board" isn't very helpful so I'll try to get to the meat of it.
The focus of this post is roleplaying forums so I will be specific to those, though a lot of it applies to any forum. You start your forum with a small group of friends, either those you had already or those you get right after you set it up, or a mix. Many times a forum dies after this core of original members moves on, because your forum failed to adapt to a changing member base. Maybe it became too closed to new players--a very common problem often exacerbated by the senior, original group of members who will often exclude them.
But a great many forums don't act exclusive at all. They are open to newbies, welcoming and kind, yet those newbies somehow stop coming after a while. You still have been advertising, still affiliating...doing everything right. So why after 5 years {or thereabouts} is your forum going belly up?
Many RPG owners are happy to let their community shrink down to a few folks and roll to a satisfying stop, before closing the game and happily moving on with fond memories. But there you are, a struggling administrator who certainly isn't ready for retirement. You're trying new plots, encouraging members to recruit others, and still your game continues to go.
One big sign that there's serious trouble is a lot of long term, active members leaving in groups, with few to no newbies coming in. This is perhaps THE alarm signal that your game is drowning. When this happens the end is already near and unless you do something drastic, you're looking at closure of the game usually within a few more months, though it can limp along for years if at least a few people stick around and you're willing to keep plugging at it.
Stop the struggle; it may actually be simpler than you think to turn things around.
To understand why it's dying, it may help to understand how it has lived. A roleplaying forum goes through life stages like a person does! Starting out in an energetic infancy, with an open mind, if little experience, growing into powerful prime of life with well established staff and members, and eventually succumbing to old age, when it tends to become set in its ways and not as open to different ways or change anymore.
But unlike a person, we can give our aging RPGs a drink from the fountain of youth!
--Your game likely began things a lot more open and rules-light than it wound up. How many rules have you added over the months or years? All games need rules, but if you're down to your last handful of members anyway, how many of them do you actually need? Turn back the clock and strip away those rules you thought you needed but that are probably the #1 factor killing your game. Ideally, you could just go back to the rule set, and minimum writing standards {do you REALLY need 500 words per post?} that you had when you started it. It was good enough then, and at this point, what do you have to lose? This is a rebirth of your site, so give it a second life! But brace yourself--people hate rule removals a lot more than adding new rules. Be sure to make it clear to them that it's a trial period and done as a last resort--and it was what got everyone started anyway. You can make a couple compromises if you need to, but the aim here is opening your game to as many new folks as you can.
--If you think tightening up on activity rules and activity checks is a smart move right now, think again. Your members' interest is flagging as it is--the last thing they want to hear is more pressure to log on X number of days a week. It just might be the breaking point for them. Remove them altogether--they don't work anyway.
--Don't do major changes to the plots that are mandatory in any way. By all means introduce new elements--you should be doing that on a regular basis anyhow--but don't require people to up and change their roleplaying just because "this is how we're going to do it now." Give them an alternative to continue playing out their original roleplays while you bring in the new elements as optional.
--Promotional efforts also need to be kept up to date. Chances are that the methods you used 5 years ago are probably not as effective now.
Here's hoping these tips help you rejuvenate your game! It's never too late.
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